Cry of the Zephyr
by tiger002
Summary: Do you remember those innocent days? Back when they seemed like they'd last always. Remember with me back when we would sing, and the songs taught us how to believe. But now those sweet days only live in our dreams.
1. One More Light (After Part 1)

**Chapter 1: One More Light (After Part 1)**

The silence of the night was shattered by the sound of an author's work being born.

The flurry of mental images flew through his mind, memories fighting against time reaching the surface. The author searching for the right words to transcribe the images and sounds into black ink on white paper. The force of the keyboard resonating with each letter it carved.

But all too soon, the light went out.

And the author, was alone, not even his shadow left to keep him company. In the dark, unable to see the words he had brought forth in front of him, it seemed almost foolish. Who was he to record such history? He wasn't some great writer. He was just a kid named Neal, living in a world that seemed unlike anything he could imagine. But the act of putting word to paper, sitting on a chair that seemed like it would fall apart any moment, being careful not to hit the old mechanical keyboard too hard lest it break, it was something. It was creating.

Instead of just looking at the door, waiting for it to open and for everything to be all right, he wanted to do something.

Even if that act was as pointless as hoping for the world to get better.

Some things couldn't be undone, and some things couldn't just go back to the way they were.

In the dark, Neal tapped his foot against the metal pole leaning on the wall, to a beat of a song that was once had glued to his heart. It wasn't like he even know that the song was anymore, it was a habit, built up over the years, and a way to keep him calm. He needed something calm. Something sane and normal. He closed his eyes, pretending that it wasn't so dark now, that he was just about to sleep and then he could wake up back in his bed, woken up by an annoying prank devised by his brother.

But for Neal, even if he did manage to sleep, that was only an illusion. A dream that he might live for a few hours, before being coldly woken to reality. Even then, a dream filled with lies might be a good escape, at least for a time.

Before he could end up deciding if he could sleep or not, the light flickered back on, causing him to look up and breath a sigh of relief, glad that they hadn't run out of power this soon. He got up from the uncomfortable metal stool, slowly making his way across the path in the floor that he had made in the evening, He pushed the two sleeping backs to the side of the room as he did so. He climbed up the couple stairs and pressed against the door at the far end of the room, pushing it up to reveal the outside world. He felt the chill of the night blowing in on him as he did so, the breeze especially powerful tonight. Neal still looked out over what little of the horizon he could see, looking for any signs of life. But of course, just as before, there was nothing but the sound of a few bugs. So he closed the door and went back inside. At the noise of the door slamming shut above him, the German Shepard at the other side of the room perked up, looking at Neal with a confused wag of her tail, something Near almost missed but for the sound of her tail hitting the wall behind her.

"Just go back to sleep Nine," he said, walking back down the stairs that led to where they lived. But the dog just wagged her tail a couple more times, happy to have someone talk to her. Unable to resist, Neal gave her a pat on the head before making his way back over to the desk that they managed to fashion out of some metal sheets and discarded wood. He looked at the typewriter that he had salvaged a couple months ago, and decided that if his mind was this awake, it would be a waste not to give birth to more words. It didn't take more than a couple seconds on the desk for memories to come flying through his head. Despite the pain they brought him, he wanted to hold onto these memories as long as he could. Though just like life, memories were a fickle thing.

Neal reached beside the desk, pulling out a couple blank sheets of paper. The old clock at the other side of the table told him it was nearly midnight, and that he should conserve the electricity, but he wasn't tried. Or at least, he wasn't tired enough to sleep. He was tired in a thousand other ways, wanting to find some way to escape, and his memories seemed like the best idea. His stomach also started growling, another sign that it might be best just to escape to his dreams.

But still, he wanted to write. He wanted to remember and let the world remember because there might come a day where he couldn't remember. Gazing at the small plaque sitting on the floor next to his sleeping bag with the words 'music lives here' carved on it, he thought back to what his dreams were, what his life was before. A chill ran down his leg again, and Neal wondered how much worse things would get when winter really came. He stared at forcing his fingers to start hitting keys even if he wasn't sure what he had to say, or if anything where to start with the thousand things he wanted to say. Maybe no one read his story, or the story of those who came before. But maybe the story would outlive him. At least, that was both the fear and hope as he mulled over the next word he should type.

He decided to focus on that chance encounter. One that would change his life forever. Even if it seemed so insignificant at the time – and in many ways was.

 **A/N:** Oh boy, this story. This story is the one I wrote for National Novel Writing Month last year in 2017. This was the seventh year I had done NaNo, where the challenge is to write a draft of a novel in a month, or at least 50k words in it. And while I did win, and even managed to finish the draft, it was probably be the hardest story I have ever written. In order to do this story right, it would took a lot more planning than I did. Typically when I write a story I have the beginning in mind and then go where the story takes me with a couple ideas in mind further in, but for this story, I needed to know the whole thing to start writing it well. Plus the whole structure of the story is unusual, which further complicated writing it. I'm not even sure what genres to put for this. I'm going with suspense/sci-fi because, well it is. But it also has some focus on romance and drama, plus music which fits poetry, some action, what could be described as an adventure, some friendship of course, and what could be considered tragedy. So, it will be something that should be a very unique story.

Also, while this may appear to be original fiction, it does utalize some story and a character from anime. For one, the character Aki who will show up soon is taken from the anime Baka and Test. I didn't originally plan for him to be in this story, but when trying to outline this he showed up and wouldn't go away. Granted, it's a bit of an AU, but that also makes this readable without knowing where he came from. Secondly, the general concept is taken from the anime short Zephyr. Since it was such a short anime, it didn't explore the world or the story as well as I wanted, even though the concept was really cool. So I decided to follow one of my favorite quotes about writing, "If there's a book that you want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it." So now a full version of this story I wanted to see has been written. I hope you'll enjoy it. Updates may be slow as I work to revise the story now that I know where I want it to go, but reviews and support will let me know if it's something worth continuing to work on.


	2. Something To Believe In (Before Part 1)

**Chapter 2: Something To Believe In(Before Part 1)**

There were few feelings more disappointing that knowing that you were just too late. You just think about all those small things that you could have done differently, the choices you could have made just a little bit better. And as Neal saw the bus pull away, he gritted his teeth while the door to the school closed behind him. He thought about running to catch it, but that bus's next stop was over a mile away. He looked down at his watch, stepping to the side to stay out of the way of the other students, or at least, the few that were still around.

Knowing there wasn't any better solution, Neal decided to sit down on the cement stairs outside of the school, and pull out his notebook, closing his eyes and trying to just let himself get lost in thought and the words on the page before him. He turned to the last page that he'd written anything on, re-reading those words from the morning, running them through his mind to different beats and melodies, emphasizing different syllables waiting for the next line to come to him.

Neal had always been fascinated by the power that words had on a person when they were told as music. He believed that more could be said than just the tongue could express. He always searched for meaning that lied within his head that could only be told through his heart. And he relished the time that he could just spend letting those words come to life in ways that he never saw coming.

But as he tried to think of the next word, the distractions kept coming. Another couple passing by talking about the weekend, or the sound of a motorcycle speeding by, or a dog barking in the distance. Even as he tried to focus, tried to block it out, they just kept coming, and tore him out of the music that he wanted to get lost in. Neal kept thinking about that Math teacher; he really should have just agreed, moved on, admitted she was right instead of leading to an argument that hadn't helped anyone.

Tossing his pen to the ground out of frustration, he looked up at the clear blue sky that he wanted to sing to but didn't know the words that he needed to do so. It was a stupid act of frustration, and he knew that. So he got up, to retrieve the pen that had rolled onto the blacktop, but before he could do so one of the teachers kicked it further out of reach without noticing, leaving Neal to decide he shouldn't even bother.

Neal was someone who believed that good things could come when all one sees is misfortune. Or at least, he believed it when said misfortune wasn't happening to him. And knowing the futility of his frustration over something so small, he still huffed and turned back to the large double-doors of the school, yanking the right one open with as much strength as he could, he headed back inside where he hoped to find some quiet despite the relative calm of the world all around him.

As he went back into school, he turned and looked at the bus schedule that they had posted for people like him who had a habit of not thinking about the impact of time. He skimmed the list for the station that would get him closest to his home and saw the next bus would come in half an hour. In a way, he was frustrated, knowing it would be so long, but always trying to remind himself that things could be worse. He heard how it was for many schools in America where they only had one shot to catch a bus to get home otherwise they'd have to find a ride or walk, and he really didn't feel like walking nearly 10 kilometers just to get home. So, he figured he might as well wait.

Neal thought about taking a seat at the cafeteria and work on homework like several others were doing, but there was something that just seemed wrong about doing homework now, though maybe it was just because he wasn't in the mood for it. Granted, he wasn't really ever in the mood for it, but at least now he had an excuse to put it aside for the time being.

"Hey," he heard a voice call out while feeling a tap on his shoulder.

"Huh?" Neal asked, tuning around, not sure why this stranger with hair in a long ponytail would be coming up to him."

"You're Neal, aren't you?" she asked, taking a step back and acting as if she was a bit shy.

"Yeah," he said, trying to figure out if he knew her. He tried to place her face - another student probably given her age, maybe a year or two younger but he was always bad at guessing people's ages. Was she maybe a friend of his sister's, or just a kid of one of his parents' friends or something.

"Good, I was hoping that you wouldn't have left yet."

Why was that, Neal was asking himself, really confused now. I mean, not even the author knows what she's doing here. The idea just came, and here she was. But who is she? Well, my sister says Hanna, let's get back to the story then.

"Do I know you?" Neal asked.

"No, but my name is Hannah," she said, taking a deep breath and taking a step forward. "I've seen you around a lot though. There's something about you that I think is really cool."

Wait, was this a love confession? Did he have a secret admirer? That was too much for him to take in. He'd never dated anyone before, what did he feel about her? Sure, she was kind of cute he guessed, the way her hair waved back and forth, her slim figured. Yeah, he might even say that she maybe was a bit hot.

"R-really, you do?"

"Well, you see," she said with a sly grin. However, before she could explain anything else an empty water bottle hit her in the head from a group of students sitting at the edge of the cafeteria.

"Get back over here Hannah," one of them said.

"Fine," Hannah pouted before turning back to Neal. "Just kidding, it's just so much fun to mess with people.

Neal just stood there shocked, trying to figure out what has just happened. So this was a random stranger. After she had walked away, he flung his hands in front of him, trying to push her away even though she had already left, but she hasn't left his memory. He wanted to punch her, though he wouldn't hit a girl, well only if they deserved it which it kind of felt like she did. Though that wouldn't' be right, people like that just wanted a reaction, and he was pretty sure that he was giving it to her. So, he instead just started running down the halls of the school, trying to avoid people and hoping that no teachers would yell at him to stop running, but they were probably just wanting to get home as well. He wanted to escape and decided he should try to get lost in his music again, trying to play those lyrics through his head again. He tried to think of words that could rhyme with 'regret', that would fit with 'anger flowing' and as he slowed to a walk, he played the beat to the song along the ceramic tiles lining the walls of the school.

It was stupid to get so worked up, to care about other people, or at least that's what he wanted to tell himself, but it was hard to not care. Even a stranger was a person, a person mattered, and a person's words still stuck with him.

So, he played out the beat, sang the songs of anger to himself, and then feeling the beat come to life more, as if he could feel it playing in his heart. He then stopped for a moment to check the time, to make sure he wouldn't miss the bus again.

Except, to his surprise, the beat continued marching, pounding against his heart, even stronger now. "Where is that coming from?" he asked aloud without meaning to. He started to look around, seeing that he was in the music wing of the school, and that as he focused on the sound that he heard more from the vibrations that the sound, telling him it was probably coming from a type of drums.

He walked down the hallway, feeling the sound getting louder, until he saw through the window on one of the doors, a person playing the drums. Excited to finally find the source of the music, he opened the door, the full force of the sound nearly knocking him off his feet since it wasn't being blocked by noise canceling padding that was around the room.

"That's really cool," he said, trying to figure out the best words that could fit in the pauses of the beat for the best effect.

The drummer looked across the room at Neal, took his headphones off and put the drumsticks to the side. "I'm sorry, did I take your practice room," he said, getting up from the seat. Neal noticed that he looked like he was Asian, the darker skin and short black hair fitting well. He was also a bit taller and stockier than Neal.

"Oh, no, I just thought that beat was cool." Neal wondered if it would be rude of him to start trying to write down the thoughts that he had right now before they left his mind. He hated it when he got a great idea at one point but it was lost before he could write it down. There were times when a lyrics or a line or an idea would come to him in a dream, but they would be lost before he could actually write them down.

"Really?' the person said.

"Yeah, I mean it was really cool." He realized how repetitive what he was saying was, but really, the word cool seemed to fit it quite well. "I wanted to learn how to play the drums, but my parents didn't' want to buy me a set, and lessons were too expensive."

"Any instruments you can play?" the other person asked, seeming to get a bit excited.

"Guitar a little bit. Though I get frustrated pretty quickly with it when I can't hit a note right."

"Well to be honest I just hit whatever feels right."

"You weren't playing a song there?" Neal asked.

"Nah, just what I was feeling I guess," the person said as he started to walk away from the drums. "I'm done now, I feel better I guess."

"Doesn't that mean you don't want to play more though, to turn your feelings of feeling better into sound?" Neal asked, thinking about all the feelings he felt when trying to write music.

"I don't know if I can play that way. I just came in here since today sucked, and I didn't want to go home," he said.

"Why not?" Neal asked, before thinking that might be a question a bit to personal. But still, he wanted to know.

"None of your business," the person snapped, confirming Neal's suspensions.

"I'm sorry man. Still, music is fun though, right? At least I think it is," he started to backpedal a bit. He thought that maybe he should just leave the room and get out of the awkward conversation. His glance started dancing around the room, looking for something else to catch his attention other than the fact that he really didn't feel right in the conversation. But then his eyes glanced at his watch, and he found something else for his mind to worry about. "Damn it, I missed that bus too!"

"Don't worry, they come every half an hour or so until seven."

"You've memorized that?" Neal asked.

"Not the first time I've used this room when the band is doing something else," he said.

"Well do you want to play more of that song from earlier? I think the beat could really fit the song I'm trying to get down on paper," Neal said, getting his red notebook out of his backpack.

"That was just improv though based how I was feeling," he said, walking back to the drums slowly, hesitating some.

"Yeah I know, but the same type of thing, like the same feeling or whatever," Neal said sitting in one of the chairs near the drums and flipping through his notebook for the right page.

"All right."

"By the way," Neal said after writing down a couple words. "The name's Neal."

"Mao," he said, sitting behind the drums and starting to play again.

Neal may have gotten home far later than normal that night. But he was lost in the ideas of music in a way he hasn't been for years. He took notes, drew the beats Mao played as best he could, trying to find the words, the clash of a thousand ideas all going through his head and trying to make them to his fingers and his notebook. He couldn't find a way to get all his thoughts down, mere pen and paper weren't enough, but the time flew for both of them. Neal was reminded of the passion in a way he hadn't noticed he'd forgotten, and Mao found a reason to play his songs again.

Neal believed that life was a matter of perspective, that the struggles in life give us opportunities and that the greatest blessings could be found in the midst of misfortune. And in those hours of music room 2330, he'd never believed it more.

 **A/N:** One of the hardest things about editing a NaNo story, especially one that was written a year ago, is knowing if I should keep the random fourth wall breaks. On the one hand, they're funny (or at least I do), on the other hand, I wanted this to be a serious story. Eh, well I guess it's good not to take myself too seriously.

Also, you may have noticed that this story is structured in an unusual way. The story is told out of order, split between "Before" chapters and "After" chapters. This was a fun way to experiment with writing in a different way, which I think gives the story a cool effect.

And lastly, thank you to Owlhero for reviewing the first chapter.


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